WE FILM - How She Move

HOW SHE MOVE
Director: Ian Iqbal Rashid
Writer: Annmarie Morais
Release Date: 25 January 2008
Genre: Drama
Rating: Rated PG-13
Filmed in Ontario

How She Move is an energetic, gritty and ultimately inspiring coming of age tale about a gifted young woman who defies all the rules as she step dances her heart out to achieve her dreams. Bursting with raw talent and intelligence, Raya Green (Wesley), the daughter of Jamaican parents, won the rare chance to break out of their drug and crime-infested neighbourhood when she was accepted into the exclusive Seaton Academy. But when her sister dies of an overdose, the family is shattered and Raya is forced to return to the place she tried so hard to escape. To Raya, getting involved with a major Step Competition was her only hope of changing her fate.

The film looks at a real Caribbean immigrant community. Set in Toronto’s “Jane-Finch corridor, How She Move showcases Canadian West Indians like they have never been showcased before.

Screenwriter Annemarie Morais, a Jamaican immigrant who grew up in Canada, developed a deep love of stepping while studying at Canada’s York University. Morais found herself compelled to write a screenplay that would have a young black woman as its central heroine.

How She Move was directed by Ian Iqbal Rashid who, like the film’s lead character, Raya Green, grew up in urban Toronto as an immigrant from Tanzania.

Michelle (Tré Armstrong), one time friend of Raya, also grew up in Toronto, and took classes at the Dance Factory in Mississauga and later attended Erindale School of Dance.
Another Caribbean-Canadian face seen in the movie is Raya`s mother Melanie- Nicholls-King of Trinidadian parentage who grew up in Toronto and attended the University of Windsor.

And then there was Raya`s crush, Bishop (Dwain Murphy), who hails from the Caribbean island of Dominica, was challenged by a high school drama teacher to pursue acting as a career and did so by enrolling in the Acting for Film & Television Program at Humber College. Playing Bishop’s younger brother, Quake, is Brennan Gademans, a BC native hip-hop dancer and actor who made his acting debut playing the young Michael Jackson in a telefilm.
Bishop’s best friend, E.C., is played by rising, Toronto-based actor Kevin Duhaney, who has already been seen in films as John Singleton’s FOUR BROTHERS. Also joining the cast as part of the Jane Street Junta is actor, dancer and Platinum-recording artist Shawn Desman, who plays Tré, the team’s sole white kid who becomes Raya’s unlikely supporter.